Sacha Archer has posted a new concrete (poetry/fiction) audiobook to bandcamp; rob mclennan's fourteenth annual 'best of' Canadian poetry titles has landed via dusie, and has a new section of "the green notebook" posted at The Typescript; Angela Caporaso's above/ground press title has landed on the Asemic Front 2 Top Ten Vispo Faves of 2024 list; Pearl Pirie offers her "Self-audit and Best of" list of 2024; Benjamin Niespodziany has three new poems up at The Pi Review; Dag T. Straumsvåg has a poem up in the "Tuesday poem" series; and a video of Stuart Ross reading at Carthage College as part of their Visiting Writers Series, Kenosha WI, October 8, 2024 is now online.
Tuesday, December 31, 2024
Tuesday, May 7, 2024
new from above/ground press: Perverse Density, by Sacha Archer
Perverse Density
Sacha Archer
$5
Snow Drift
If it doesn’t stop snowing can you bear to hear
I told you so? The sled shifted, they were too eager, too
quick, look at us, look at us, and yesterday
becomes today, the sled shifts and turns, the girls
tumble, the screen goes blank. When it’s bright again,
who is sitting on a bench pouting with a cookie,
and who is it that will pass with ease on her skates?
Yesterday was just the same. Snow so heavy
we found a thousand different things to do
done a thousand different times before
we invented them, which mattered nothing to us.
We slept soundly. The second quivered in its spot.
published in Ottawa by above/ground press
May 2024
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy
Sacha Archer is a Canadian writer and concrete poet. His most recent publication is cellsea, published by Timglaset. Some of Archer’s other publications include Empty Building (Penteract Press), Mother’s Milk (Timglaset), which was included on CBC’s best poetry books of 2020 list, KIM (knife|fork|book), Hydes (nOIR:Z), as well as a collaborative sound poetry album with nina jane drystek, Years Between Rooms which can be found on Bandcamp. His book Havana Syndrome is forthcoming from The Blasted Tree. Find him on Facebook and Instagram @sachaarcher.
This is Archer’s third above/ground press chapbook, after upROUTE : The Language of Plates (2017) and Autopsy Report (2018).
To order, send cheques (add $1 for postage; in US, add $2; outside North America, add $5) to: rob mclennan, 2423 Alta Vista Drive, Ottawa ON K1H 7M9. E-transfer or PayPal at rob_mclennan (at) hotmail.com or the PayPal button at www.robmclennan.blogspot.com
Saturday, January 27, 2024
some author activity: MacEachern, mclennan, Archer, Heroux + Barwin,
Jessi MacEachern, nina jane drystek, rob mclennan and Sacha Archer (among others) all have work in the final issue of Carousel, which also includes an interview between Jason Heroux and Jerrod Edson; and Gary Barwin is on the inaugural League of Canadian Poets Spoken Word Award shortlist.
Saturday, September 9, 2023
some author activity: Witek, eckhoff, Kemp-Gee, Casteels + Archer,
forthcoming author Terri Witek has new work up at Michigan Quarterly Review; kevin mcpherson eckhoff and Kimberley Dyck collaboratively answer some questions on their collaborations at Touch the Donkey; forthcoming author Meghan Kemp-Gee has work in Columba Poetry; and both Michael e. Casteels and Sacha Archer have new visual work up at utsanga.
Saturday, July 15, 2023
some author activity: Moseman, Deutch, mclennan, Notley + Archer,
Lori Anderson Moseman has a poem up in the "Tuesday poem" series; Amanda Deutch has new work up at The Brooklyn Rail; rob mclennan has a new poem up at Pinhole Poetry, and is interviewed over there as well; Alice Notley has a new poem up at The New York Times Magazine, as selected by Anne Boyer; and Sacha Archer reads soon at Toronto's Type Books as part of the milk magazine reading series!
Thursday, April 14, 2022
some author activity: Betts, Pakdal, Archer, Pirie, Clayton, hanna, Boyle + mclennan,
Gregory Betts has a new poem up on the Chaudiere Books blog, as part of National Poetry Month, as does forthcoming author Saba Pakdal, and even Sacha Archer; Pearl Pirie has been posting mini-interviews/reviews lately, featuring Conyer Clayton, natalie hanna, Frances Boyle and rob mclennan, among others.
Saturday, December 18, 2021
some author activity: Archer, Collis, MacEachern, Niespodziany, Mody + The Free Nashville Poetry Library,
[above/ground press items seen in the wild at The Free Nashville Poetry Library; photo by Megan M. Garr] Sacha Archer is interviewed over at Artisanal Writer; Stephen Collis has a new poem up at the scales project; Jessi MacEachern has a new poem (audio and text) up at Vallum magazine; Benjamin Niespodziany has some new work up at Blue Arrangements; and Monica Mody has a poem up in the Tuesday poem series over at the dusie blog.
Saturday, November 13, 2021
some author activity: hanna, Tracy, Niespodziany, Betts, Beaulieu, Siklosi, Spinosa, Mavreas, Flemmer, Archer + Barwin,
natalie hanna has some new work up at where is the river; Dale Tracy participates in the Spotlight series; Benjamin Niespodziany has a new poem up at The Indianapolis Review; and Gregory Betts and Derek Beaulieu have co-edited a new short visual poetry anthology available as a free pdf, 14 Ways of Being Kinder to the Earth, with poems by fourteen visual poets, including Kate Siklosi, Dani Spinosa, Billy Mavreas, Kyle Flemmer, Sacha Archer and Gary Barwin.
Saturday, September 25, 2021
some author activity: Ross, Reid, Tate, Archer, Gunnars, Jirgens, Norris + Young,
Stuart Ross is a finalist for the 4th James Tate International Poetry Prize, for his full-length manuscript, "Cringe System"; Monty Reid is interviewed over at Train : a poetry journal; Bronwen Tate now has a newsletter you can sign up for; Sacha Archer has posted "an improvisation by Sacha Archer played on a broken stand-up piano that was found in a large dumpster in the downtown of Peterborough, Ontario c. 2007" via YouTube; and above/ground press authors Ken Norris, Karl Jirgens, Geoffrey Young and Kristjana Gunnars, among others, have new work in the latest issue of mouse eggs.
Saturday, August 29, 2020
some author activity: Beaulieu, Spinosa, Siklosi, Earl, Mohammadi + Archer,
Wednesday, April 22, 2020
some author activity: Pirie, Archer, Aigen, Boyle + Unsworth,
Saturday, April 11, 2020
some author activity: Kasimor, Eleftherion, Archer, Tracy + Sikkema,
Sunday, January 19, 2020
new from above/ground press: G U E S T [a journal of guest editors] #8 : guest-edited by Kate Siklosi and Dani Spinosa
edited by Kate Siklosi and Dani Spinosa
see here for Kate and Dani’s introduction
the eighth issue features new work by:
Clara Daneri
Dessa Bayrock
Brian Dedora
Marilyn R. Rosenberg
Hart Broudy
Amanda Earl
Logan K. Young
Genevieve Kaplan
K.S. Ernst
Sacha Archer
M. NourbeSe Philip
Katherine Heigh
Catherine Bennett
psw
Angela Caporaso
$6 + postage / + $1 for Canadian orders; + $2 for US; + $6 outside of North America
kate & dani, in all their gap-toothed, riotous ferocity, have been making things and situations weird since, like, forever.
Brian Dedora, a grown man playing with pen&ink, bits of paper, photos and the odd word in the playground that is Toronto… Oh no, not that...
As usual, Marilyn R. Rosenberg works are actual and virtual images made with pens, inks and gouache scanned into the computer to change and merge to become visual and asemic poems. MRR's works are on/in 2018-19 exhibitions, blogs and web publications and print edition pages. Her two latest individual artists' books are FADE TO BLACK, Part three of Otoliths issue forty-eight, published by Otoliths, Australia, March 2018 and FALSE FICTION FRACTURED FACT ALTERED, Post-Asemic Press #008, USA, 2019.
Hart Broudy is a writer & graphic designer/visual poet living in Toronto. His visual poetry has been exhibited nationally and internationally in the US, UK and EU. His first novella was published in 1976 and his latest in 2016. His work is concerned primarily with uncertainty and the ephemeral nature of meanings and language forms in space.
Amanda Earl is an Ottawa writer, visual poet, editor and publisher. She's the managing editor of Bywords.ca and the fallen angel of AngelHousePress. Her goals are whimsy, connection, and exploration. She came late to feminism in her fifties, which is a regret, but she will no longer let herself be prevented from expressing her full on roar, and showing solidarity and support to women and gender nonconforming kindreds. Amanda loves vispo and vizpo. For more information, please visit AmandaEarl.com or connect with her on Twitter @KikiFolle.
Dessa Bayrock lives in Ottawa with two cats and a variety of succulents, one of which occasionally blooms. She used to unfold paper for a living at Library and Archives Canada, and is currently a PhD student in English, where she continues to fold and unfold paper. Her work has appeared in Funicular, PRISM, and Poetry Is Dead, among others, and her work was recently shortlisted for the Metatron Prize for Rising Authors. She is the editor of post ghost press. You can find her, or at least more about her, at dessabayrock.com, or on Twitter at @yodessa.
Logan K. Young’s factorial chapbook, I(<3 i="">, is out now. A summer student of Thurston Moore at Naropa’s Kerouac School, he's since been published everywhere from UPenn's Jacket2 to Taper 3 at MIT and anthologized as far flung as ToCall (PSW Gallery) and the forthcoming collection, Erase the Patriarchy (University of Hell Press). Recent exhibitions include Day de Dada Art Nurses in Boston and at WFMU's Monty Hall.
Genevieve Kaplan is the author of (aviary) (Veliz Books, forthcoming 2020); In the ice house (Red Hen Press), winner of the A Room of Her Own Foundation‘s poetry publication prize; and three chapbooks. Her poems have recently appeared in South Dakota Review, Poetry Northwest, and Thrush. She edits the Toad Press International chapbook series, publishing contemporary translations of poetry and prose.
Much of K.S. (Kathy) Ernst’s work is painted, collaged, or digital, and she uses three-dimensional letters to create freestanding sculptures. In addition to literary magazines her pieces are often exhibited in galleries and museums. Recent books include Drop Caps and Sequencing: (both from Xexoxial Editions) and The Last Vispo Anthology (Fantagraphics). Books with Sheila E. Murphy are Permutoria (Luna Bisonte Prods) and 2 Juries + 2 Storeys = 4 Stories Toujours (Xexoxial Editions). Sites housing substantial collections of Ernst’s work are Ohio State University Avant Garde and Experimental Writing Collection; The Poetry Collection of the University Libraries, University at Buffalo; and Yale University’s Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. www.ksernst.com.
Sacha Archer is a writer who works in numerous mediums as well as being the editor of Simulacrum Press. Archer’s most recent publications include An Event Poem (Noir:Z, 2019), TSK oomph (Inspiritus Press, 2018), Contemporary Meat (The Blasted Tree, 2018) and Autopsy Report (above/ground press, 2018). His chapbooks Houses (No Press) and Framing Poems (Timglaset) are forthcoming. Archer lives in Burlington, Ontario with his wife and two daughters. His website is sachaarcher.wordpress.com.
M. NourbeSe Philip is an unembedded poet, essayist, novelist, playwright, and former lawyer who lives in the space-time of the city of Toronto. She is a Guggenheim Fellow (USA) and the recipient of many awards including the Casa de las Americas prize (Cuba). Among her best-known published works are She Tries Her Tongue; Her Silence Softly Breaks, Looking for Livingstone: An Odyssey of Silence, and Harriet’s Daughter, a young adult novel. Philip’s last work of poetry, Zong!, is a genre-breaking poem, which engages with the law, history, and memory as they relate to the transatlantic slave trade. Bla_K, a collection of essays, is her most recent work.
Clara Daneri is an artist and illustrator, exploring the relationship between digital and analogue media. In 2016, she cofounded Penteract Press, as a venue for international structure-based experimental poetry. She tweets @claradaneri.
Katherine Heigh has written two chapbooks, PTBO NSA (bird buried press) and To The People Who Used to Live Here (Gap Riot Press). She was the 2015 recipient of the P.K. Page Poetry Prize. Appearing in various print and online publications, her work is inspired by the mystical in the mundane, the corporeality of consciousness, and a lot of nostalgic nonsense.
C. Mehrl Bennett is an artist living in Columbus OH with poet spouse, John M. Bennett, whom she met via the mailart network. Her media includes junk assemblings, digital art, collage/drawing/painting, poetry, visual poetry, short songs, performance event scores, mailart (handmade books, artistamp sheets, rubberstamp carving, flux related ephemera, archiving, network activities), video and audio recordings. She is book designer/ associate editor (with JMB) of publishing imprint Luna Bisonte Prods.
Her blog is at: http://cmehrlbennett.wordpress.com/
psw is a Germany-based discoverer in outdated printmaking techniques. She creates abstract typographics on typewriters and with dry transfer letters, prints metal type graphics on the proofing press, and duplicates her work with mimeographs - making books from her work. She is also creator of the ongoing mimeo printed magazine ToCall.
Angela Caporaso is an Italian artist and women book artist. Angela Caporaso's art has always been characterized by a constant research and experimentation. Since her first exhibitions, which date back to the eighties, she has revealed a constant strain towards new expressive languages. This constant research led Angela to contaminate sign with colour, font with image, literature with painting, as though one single medium was not sufficient to express her complex imaginative world.
http://www.angelacaporaso.com
Saturday, January 4, 2020
some author activity: Perry, Pirie, Gurton-Wachter + Archer,
Saturday, December 21, 2019
some author activity: Archer, Clayton, Baus, Aigen + Earl,
Saturday, October 12, 2019
some author activity: Aigen, Siklosi, Campanello, mclennan, Archer + Banu,
Saturday, June 1, 2019
some author activity: Archer, Armantrout + Perry,
Friday, February 22, 2019
new from above/ground press: uoiea, by Franco Cortese
Franco Cortese
$5
aûaaiaau,aai uaûa;ûaûauéué,ûaûaui;ua,éoéo,aoeo,au au,au au,au uiauau,ea, ea,uáuá,oi,ôiôiao, ûa;éoéo.
ringto copulate
contagion,
whose cause
the rain;
tendons
to flutter,
tendons
to ask;
ceremonial staff
ashes,
nightfall
a fragrance,
smoke dew,
bile current,
I ask
to shout in pain,
to rise, get up,
to reside,
to move away,
to stir and stir
nightfall, the rain;
ashes.
published in Ottawa by above/ground press
February 2019
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy
Cover images/design: Sacha Archer
Franco Cortese is an experimental poet living in Thorold, Ontario. His previous work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Capilano Review, Canadian Literature, filling Station, ditch, The Operating System, Eunoia Review and others. He has had chapbooks, leaflets, booklets, nanopamphlets and other poetic ephemera published by or forthcoming through nopress, The Blasted Tree, Spacecraft Press, Penteract Press and Simulacrum Press, and his poetry has appeared in the anthology Concrete and Constraint (Penteract Press 2018). uoiea is his third chapbook.
To order, send cheques (add $1 for postage; in US, add $2; outside North America, add $5) to: rob mclennan, 2423 Alta Vista Drive, Ottawa ON K1H 7M9. E-transfer or PayPal at at rob_mclennan (at) hotmail.com or the PayPal button at www.robmclennan.blogspot.com
Saturday, January 5, 2019
some author activity: Archer, Sweeney, Armantrout + Robinson,
Tuesday, November 13, 2018
The Factory Reading Series pre-small press book fair reading, November 23: Zuchter, Flack, Chisholm, Archer + Pirie,
The Factory Reading Series
pre-small press book fair reading
featuring readings by:
Ruth Zuchter (Toronto)lovingly hosted by rob mclennan
Brian L. Flack (Prince Edward County ON)
Allison Chisholm (Kingston ON)
Sacha Archer (Burlington ON)
+ Pearl Pirie (rural Quebec)
Friday, November 23, 2018;
doors 7pm; reading 7:30pm
The Carleton Tavern,
223 Armstrong Street (at Parkdale; upstairs)
[And don’t forget the ottawa small press book fair, held the following day at the Jack Purcell Community Centre]
After working for over a dozen years in the digital media and marketing industry, Ruth Zuchter [pictured] launched her freelance writing and editing career in 2013, and the rest, as “they” say, is history. Ruth was the house copy editor and marketing copywriter for BookThug from 2011 through 2017. In that time, she worked on almost 80 different books, including novels, poetry collections, memoirs, and entre-genre titles. She also worked as an editorial intern for Knopf Canada and Random House Canada in 2013. Her poetry has been published in (parenthetical), Influency: A Poetry Salon, and elsewhere. Ruth holds an M.A. in Sociology from Western University and has completed courses with the University of Toronto, Ryerson University, and the Toronto New School of Writing, exploring poetry and prose writing, narrative and language use, and the practice of copy editing. In her off-hours, you’ll find Ruth plucking away at one of the three novels she has on the go or hiking with her husband and two rescue mutts in the wilds of Toronto. She is launching The Mother Suite, her chapbook with AngelHousePress.
Brian L. Flack is the author of three novels … In Seed Time, With A Sudden & Terrible Clarity, and When Madmen Lead the Blind, and a collection of poems … 36 … Poems. He has contributed literary & social criticism to books, periodicals, and academic journals, and written many reviews for newspapers. For several years, he was the host of a weekly radio programme, “Bookviews”, on Q-107, in Toronto. In another life that he enjoyed for almost 40 years, he was a Professor of English Literature. He lives with the painter Susan Straiton ... by the lake, in Prince Edward County, Ontario.
Allison Chisholm was born in Cobourg and lives in Kingston, Ontario. She played glockenspiel in the Hawaiian-Dream-Pop band SCUB. Her poetry has appeared in The Northern Testicle Review, The Dollhouse (Puddles of Sky Press) and Train: a journal of investigation. Her chapbook, On the Count of One, was published in 2017 (Proper Tales Press). On the Count of None (A Feed Dog Book from Anvil Press) is her first full-length poetry collection. She is the curator of the Museum of Tiny Objects.
Sacha Archer is a writer that works in numerous mediums as well as being the editor of Simulacrum Press (simulacrumpress.ca). His work has been published internationally. Archer has two full-length collections of poetry, Detour (gradient books, 2017) and Zoning Cycle (Simulacrum Press, 2017), as well as a number of chapbooks, the most recent being TSK oomph (Inspiritus Press, 2018), Contemporary Meat (The Blasted Tree, 2018) and Autopsy Report (above/ground press, 2018). His visual poetry has been exhibited in the USA, Italy, and Canada. Some of that work, among other things, can be found on his website, sachaarcher.wordpress.com. Archer lives in Burlington, Ontario.
Pearl Pirie writes from rural Quebec. www.pearlpirie.com